The end of the rail franchise system is not new news. The franchise agreements were effectively terminated in March 2020 when the government bailed out operato

The end of the rail franchise system is not new news. The franchise agreements were effectively terminated in March 2020 when the government bailed out operators due to Covid. By July, the ONS announced that rail operators were now considered part of the public sector for statistics purposes, signalling that they had effectively been nationalised: https://www.ons.gov.uk/news/news/theonsclassifiestrainoperatingcompaniesnowrunningunderemergencymeasuresagreements https://www.ons.gov.uk/news/news/theonsclassifiestrainoperat... In September 2020 the government announced that franchises would be not return: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/21/uk-covid-19-rail-rescue-measures-dft-franchising https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/21/uk-covid-19... What’s new with this announcement is that the functions of several organisations (Network Rail, ATOC/National Rail, etc) will be merged together into a single new entity.